TheMagnitudeofMing THE MAGNITUDE OF MING Command, Allotment, and Fate in Chinese Culture Edited by Christopher Lupke University of Hawai`i Press Honolulu ( 2005 University of Hawai`i Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America 050607080910654321 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The magnitude of ming : command, allotment, and fate in Chinese culture / edited by Christopher Lupke. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8248-2739-2 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Fate and fatalism. 2. Philosophy, Chinese. I. Lupke, Christopher. BJ1461.M34 2005 1230.0951Ðdc22 2004014194 Publication of this book has been assisted by a grant from the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange. University of Hawai`i Press books are printed on acid-free paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Council on Library Resources. Designed by University of Hawai`i Press production staff Printed by The Maple-Vail Book Manufacturing Group For My Mother, Clara Lupke Contents Preface ix Diverse Modes of Ming: An Introduction Christopher Lupke 1 Part I The Foundations of Fate Early Chinese Conceptions of Ming 1 Command and the Content of Tradition David Schaberg 23 2 Following the Commands of Heaven: The Notion of Ming in Early China Michael Puett 49 3 Languages of Fate: Semantic Fields in Chinese and Greek Lisa Raphals 70 4 How to Steer through Life: Negotiating Fate in the Daybook Mu-chou Poo 107 Part II Escape Attempts from Finitude Ming in the Later Han and Six Dynasties Period 5 Living off the Books: Fifty Ways to Dodge Ming in Early Medieval China Robert Ford Campany 129 6 Simple Twists of Fate: The Daoist Body and Its Ming Stephen R.Bokenkamp 151 7 Multiple Vistas of Ming and Changing Visions of Life in the Works of Tao Qian Zong-qi Cai 169 vii Part III Reversals of Fortune and Reversals of Reality The Literary Career of Ming in Late Imperial Fiction and Drama 8 Turning Lethal Slander into Generative Instruction: Laws, Ledgers, and the Changing Taxonomies of Fictional Production in Late Imperial China Patricia Sieber 205 9 Fate and Transcendence in the Rhetoric of Myth and Ritual P.Steven Sangren 225 Part IV Determinism's Progress Voluntarism, Gender, and the Fate of the Nation in Modern China 10 Hubris in Chinese Thought: A Theme in Post-Mao Cultural Criticism Woei Lien Chong 245 11 Gendered Fate Deirdre Sabina Knight 272 12 Divi/Nation: Modern Literary Representations of the Chinese Imagined Community Christopher Lupke 291 Selected Bibliography 331 List of Contributors 364 Index 367 viii v Contents Preface One wonders whether other topics in the scholarship on China are as po- tentially personal as an examination of ming. All living beings must deal with this notion, which in Chinese involves an imbrication of concepts that in the West we consider discrete entities, such as ``fate,'' ``life,'' ``allotment,'' and (heavenly or humanly) ``command.'' My own ®rst encounter with ming was an unforgettable one, one that in part has lead to this project. In the mid- 1980s I was studying at the Inter-University Program on the campus of Na- tional Taiwan University. One of my independent reading courses was on the subject of Zhuangzi taught by Jin Jiaxi ÑÉ+. As we perused the Inner Chapters and their layers of commentary, Jin Laoshi frequently emphasized that an understanding of ming was fundamental to a proper apprehension of Zhuangzi's thought and, by extension, a proper way to live as well. Professor Jin's expertise in phonetics led him to develop a theory about an intricate system of double entendres in Zhuangzi. It was a rich course for which I recorded copious notes in anticipation that I might possibly continue on to write a dissertation involving this compelling philosophical classic. One day I happened to forget my book bag in a taxi while riding in Taipei. In that bag were a camera, a recently purchased edition of the Shiji, and all my Zhuangzi notes. One can imagine my grief at having lost those notes, the other items of course being easily replaced. A few days later I related what had happened to Jin Laoshi and was stunned by his reaction, which I will never forget. He looked at me unmoved and dryly responded to the news: ``That's ming. There's nothing you can do about it. Move on.'' Jin's point was not that one should go through life with a fatalistic outlook but that an understanding of the inexorable vagaries of life (ming) meant that one should coexist with and not resist them. This accep- tance of the forces of life was actually liberating and resulted in a new sort of agency, one that did not entail traversing the inevitable. While a considerable loss in terms of content and work, the experience of losing those notes was a powerful and unforgettable lesson in the need to relinquish the illusion of control over life. And it has remained vivid in my memory. Over ten years later, in December of 1996, I believe, at the annual meeting of the Modern Language Association in Washington, DC, I met ix Deirdre Sabina Knight, who was writing her dissertation on determinism and its connection to female agency in modern Chinese literature. Considering her topic, she was, of course, very interested in the Chinese concept of ming. We began to discuss the idea of developing a panel for the Association for Asian Studies. As this idea gathered momentum over the next year, what we found was that virtually all the scholars we spoke to in Chinese studies ac- knowledged the relevance of ming to their varied research interests. One panel mushroomed into a double panel, and eventually into a conference. Knight and I coorganized the panels for the 1998 AAS in Washington, DC. We had eight presenters, two discussants, and two chairs. The success of the panels led us to continue to pursue the idea into a conference and then into the present volume of essays. After the AAS, I took responsibility for devel- oping a grant proposal to the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for a confer- ence. I was able to secure a palatial venue at the Breckenridge Conference Center in York, Maine, for the conference. We invited a few more pre- senters, and over a dozen papers were presented at the conference. Erica Andree designed the advertising poster, and the basic image of that poster, with an etching by the Mongolian-Chinese artist Su Xinping Ç°s called ``The Dream'' " overlayed with calligraphy by an artist who wishes to re- main anonymous now graces the cover of this book. This was in May 2000. I subsequently moved to Washington State University where I devel- oped a website posting all the revised versions of the papers so that the par- ticipants could comment on each other's essays and think about them as they further revised their own. This process has led to a ®nal product exhibiting more continuity, or at least cross-reference, if still individually conceived chapters, than is found in most edited volumes. I hope readers will be able to sense some of the interaction in them that made the conference so stimulat- ing. After considerable revision, what began as a loss and as a fortuitous conversation at a conference has now blossomed into this book, consisting of twelve very different approaches to the complex issue of ming in Chinese culture. Bringing this project into print has not in any way followed what I had im- agined the normal trajectory for a scholarly project to be. It has emerged as a collaboration, most notably with Sabina Knight but also with the other con- tributors, and the synergy of these unpredictable encounters has shaped the ®nal product even as it has forged new friendships and collegial relations. There are therefore many people whose participation at various stages, sup- port and encouragement all along the way, and contributions to the success of the project deserve grateful acknowledgment. Foremost among these is Sabina, without whose chance encounter at the MLA this project never x v Preface would have been initiated, and without whose sustained involvement in it might never have reached its ®nal form. She deserves great credit as the pri- mum mobile of the project. Yi-tsi Mei Feuerwerker and Richard J. Smith, two beloved mentors who championed the project from its inception, served as the chairs of the original AAS panels. Their con®dence in it helped secure its acceptance in that venue and was therefore crucial at that convocation. Anthony Yu and Wai-Yee Li served as trenchant and engaged discussants to those ®rst two panels, and their involvement must also be recognized. Several prominent scholars in the ®eld lent their moral support to the project, re- marked on its importance, and encouraged us to continue with it. Many would have written essays for the book had their professional lives not al- ready been ®lled with other projects. These include Ron Guey Chu, Patricia Ebrey, Wai-Yee Li, Stephen West, Hung Wu, and Anthony Yu, among others. Thomas Wilson was someone I had hoped to attract to the project as well. Although he too was overwhelmed with his own endeavors, he assisted in the critical role of suggesting other scholars, many of whose works are now in the volume. The conference in Maine could not have been a success without the guidance and presence of Roger Ames, who was an invaluable source of advice as I planned the conference. Kidder Smith's enthusiasm for the project, and particularly his offer to speak at the conference, was also an asset.